This invention relates to bus bars, and more particularly to an improved device for connecting a circuit breaker to a bus bar. A more specific object of this invention is to provide an improved plastic housing for attachment to a,bus bar, and for readily and removably accommodating and connecting a circuit breaker to a conductor of the attached bus bar.
Heretofore in order to connect a circuit breaker to a bus bar circuit, it has been necessary to employ cables, screws and other elements for releasably connecting the circuit breaker to the bus bar conductor carrying the current load. Such breakers are often connected to telecommunication bus bar circuits, but heretofore it has been extremely difficult and time consuming for a customer to connect a circuit breaker to such circuit.
It is an object of this invention, therefore, to provide a novel housing disposed to be secured to a bus bar, and having therein sockets for accommodating components of the bus bar, as well as components of a circuit breaker which can be readily inserted into the housing to have the components thereof placed in electrical contact with the components of the bus bar.
Still another object of this invention is to provide an improved, plastic circuit breaker housing disposed to be interposed between a bus bar conductor, and a circuit breaker to permit simple and easy connection of the circuit breaker to the bus bar conductor. Still a more specific object of this invention is to provide an improved, plastic housing disposed to be secured to a rigid bus bar structure, and having therein a recess designed to guide a circuit breaker body and contacts thereof into engagement with contacts of the bus bar structure.
Other objects of the invention will be apparent hereinafter from the specification and from the recital of the appended claims, particularly when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
A housing made of a generally rigid plastic material has therein a pair of chambers, one of which is larger than the other and both of which open on a front of the housing. The larger chamber, which is adapted to releasably accommodate therein a circuit breaker, is closed at its opposite end by an integral back wall of the housing, which is disposed to be secured by a pair of plastic bolts against the plane surface of a bus bar. The housing back wall has therein a pair of spaced recesses which open through narrow slots onto the larger chamber, and which have housed therein female terminal sockets which are disposed to accommodate a pair of spaced terminals which project from the circuit breaker that is releasably insertable into the larger chamber. One such female socket extends from a conductor in the laminated bus bar and into one of the spaced recesses, and the other female socket is connected to a male terminal which extends into the smaller chamber in spaced relation to a further male terminal which extends from the bus bar into the smaller chamber through an opening in the back wall.